@Goatrevolt: As for as mana goes, it is easy to chain Sign in blood late game. However, every now and again you just want have the two life to spare lol. Still it is all around the best imo.
I didn't mean that you wouldn't have 2 black to pay, but rather that it may prevent you from doing something like Sign into Cruel or Sign into Sorin. At any rate, that's kind of a minor point, as both aren't terribly hard to chain late game. The 2 life is more of a problem.
@Mooky: I'd suggest running some basic swamps. They turn on both Dragonskull and Drowned Catacombs, so a swamp means you won't have to worry about ever playing those tapped (not always relevant, but sometimes) and with your mana base you have to draw 3 copies of 12 specific lands to be able to play Cruel. I feel like you will run into situations a non-trivial amount of times where you are missing triple black for cruel, and it seems like you would struggle to play Sign in Blood consistently early game.
The Vampire deck was actually Mono Black control I believe, which is why it didn't have Nocturnus or many other vampires. It looked pretty solid actually, and the guy seemed to play it well. Top 8 in VA was actually pretty light on Jund. 2 G/W tokens, Grixis Control, U/W Control, Jund, Mono Black, Naya and 1 more I can't recall.
I ran 2 copies of Sign in Blood to complement Divination, which I feel is the best draw spell available for this archetype. I would have run 6 copies of Divination if I could have, but alas.
I was worried about the life loss from sign in blood, but it turned out to not be very relevant, and I actually liked Sign a lot. I rarely play a draw spell until turn 5 or 6, when I can play divination and still have mana to play other cards on the same turn, unless I'm in desperate need to draw something relevant. Sign in Blood is good because it steps up that clock to turn 4 for a draw 2 effect, whereas divination is turn 5. Sign in Blood is also a really good play turn 2 on the play against any deck that doesn't lead off with a mana producer. Turn 2 Sign in Blood means you can't play turn 3 Double Negative, but you don't need turn 3 Double negative on the play anyway, you'll need it turn 4 for Bloodbraid.
The only reason I would stick with 4 copies of Divination prior to adding any copies of Sign in Blood is because of the all-too common late game chaining Divinations into each other situations I find myself in all the time. With Sign in Blood that just gets painful (as well as being harder to cast...BBBB vs. 4UU).
The mana cost isn't an issue for Sign in Blood. Triple black is the easiest part for hitting Cruel, and double black for Sign in Blood is easier to hit than UUR for Double Negative, even though you obviously lead off with UUR for the turn 3 Double Neg. It's not unrealistic to play T1 Crumbling necropolis, T2 Mountain, T3 Island, and T4 swamp (or Drowned Catacomb/Dragonskull Summit) and be able to easily cast Sign in Blood and still keep up Mountain/Island for counter/Bolt.
My mana base isn't even black intensive, at least not to the levels of Chapin's mana base, and I still had absolutely no issues ever casting Sign in Blood. There are 12 lands that double as Black/x producers that allow you to cast Sign in Blood or cast Double Negative, etc.
One last reason to run Sign in Blood is that I picked up some style points for finishing a guy off with it when he was at 1! Divination can't kill, now can it!
I agree on Sphinx of Jwar Isle. I think that card is essential. Sphinx of Lost Truths is obviously good at digging to Cruel, but Sphinx of Jwar is simply good enough to where you might not even need the Cruel, and is a stand-alone threat. I liked the 2/1 split I ran, but I wouldn't cry cutting Sphinx of Lost Truths altogether.
Bolting your own creature in response to a tendrils is completely dependent on the situation you're in.
This. If your opponent has a fistful of cards and probably has a nighthawk in hand, then don't bolt your guide (aka, the turn 4 tendrils). If your opponent just emptied or near emptied his hand with that tendrils, then bolt your guide. Holding back a bolt to give your opponent upwards of +6 life because you're afraid of them drawing into nighthawk is dumb. You just gave them extra turns to draw it.
Doesn't RDW run both 4 bolt and 4 Burst Lightning anyway? The chances of them top decking a nighthawk is lower than the chances of you top decking another card that kills it.
And for a more thread relevant discussion: Ruinblaster is really good against Jund and in Jund mirrors. Even if ruinblaster doesn't necessarily cut them off of a color of mana, it makes Broodmate that much harder to cast, or keeps them off of Bituminous Blast for another turn, etc.
Runeflare Trap were a nod to Jacerator, which I expected to see a lot of. I'm happy to say that I avoided that matchup.
My list is wildly different from the guy who made top 4. My list has more "standard" choices (if there even is such a thing for an unproven deck), while his is a lot more rogue and techy. I can't say which is better without playing his list at all, but I will say that I like my list a lot and felt like it was simply stronger than any of the decks I played against. My loss to Vampires involved him beating me game 1, me winning game 2, and then game 3 being a really long drawn out match. At one point, he had no cards, no creatures, and I had 2 double negatives and a lightning bolt in hand. I thought I win for sure at that point, but I top deck 7 lands and lose. My loss to mono white involved a misplay turn 1 where I led off with the wrong land, and wasn't able to bolt his steppe lynx, which dealt me just enough damage for him to win (I was 1 life away from stablizing). Game 2 was very similar in that I nearly stabilized at 1 life, but I got blown out with a turn 6 Conqueror's pledge with brave the elements backup for my earthquake.
I beat Jund 3 rounds (2-1, 2-1, 2-0) with my only losses being identical: T2 putrid leech when I was on the draw with 2+ pieces of counter magic in hand and no bolt/terminate. I kept those hands hoping to get counter mana up before they dropped a relevant threat, and then just playing draw-go counter until I could drop a turn 5 SGC or turn 6 Sphinx or Turn 7 Cruel. My other wins were 2-0 to RWU control, 2-0 to GWB rock and 2-1 to 4 color sedraxis specter aggro.
I went 6-2 with Grixis Control. This is the best control deck in the format right now. It has game against Jund and doesn't scrub out against other decks like some specific "hate on Jund" lists do.
I am going to Va richmond states and have my fingers crossed that, my last 2 arid mesa's get here in time. Anyone going and has mesa's for trade would love to chat with you, just in case
We might be able to work something out, if needed.
Do you need the ramp or not? Is ramping to 4 mana fairly essential, and do you struggle to reach 4 mana? Use Rampant Growth. Would you like the possibility for ramp, but don't care if it doesn't actually happen? Then use Lotus Cobra. The "Lotus Cobra might draw removal for my other guys" argument is meaningless if your deck relies on Lotus Cobra NOT drawing removal so you can actually hit 4 mana on turn 3. In that situation you want rampant growth. If you simply want another 2 drop that gets in for 2, that can also sometimes ramp you, then go with Cobra.
Basically, don't give your opponent the winning choice. If the winning choice is that they remove your cobra, so that they can't later kill your "insert fattie here" and the ramp is just a nice effect but ultimately unnecessary to your strategy, then play Cobra. If the winning choice is playing Bloodbraid on turn 3, then run Rampant.
Nissa is only good with 2+ chosen. Why? Because Chosen are terrible at dying. Look at the things that they trade with: Bog Tatters (if you have no swamps), unlandfalled Crocodiles, Ruinous Minotaurs, Scythe Tiger, and 2 uncommon allies.
Everything else they don't trade with at all. They either kill outright, or just chump. Because of that, your chosen just really don't die very often. So if you only have one chosen, there's a very good chance that Nissa is just Ajani without his -1 ability. Yes, you can use the one chosen for a dedicated stream of chump blockers against something like Geopede, but frankly, that's a very unexciting use of the card.
Since chosen is something you take over almost every green card in a green deck (WITHOUT Nissa) I would NEVER P1P1 her in a redraft situation, as it puts me in the worst color fighting for the best common in that color. Moreover, with the obnoxious amount of evasion in draft, there's a good chance she just comes down, gets a chosen, and dies to a boar.
So it's better than Grazing Gladehart in the worst case? Seems pretty fantastic to me.
The explanation of why it's bad involves you gaining 2 life a turn while the creature she brought into play doesn't die. I'm struggling to understand the bad part of this story, because that actually sounds really good to me, and exactly the kind of card Green uses to win games in this format.
sorry but this is so very wrong. I have only been playing since alara block, that means for the duration of my time playing magic cancel has been the main counterspell wizards has printed. and it sucks. I tried using it when i first started playing (always preferred control decks) but it just didn't work. the fact that countering a card cost the same as blightning or rhox war monk is just ridiculous.
I started playing in Time Spiral, the set when they first printed Cancel. People didn't complain about it then. It was played in teachings. I seriously never heard anyone whining on any forums about how bad Cancel was. It wasn't on the level of remand or rune snag, but it was worth playing alongside the two. I quit playing for a year after Lorwyn, and when I came back I saw an absurd number of posts dedicated to saying how bad cancel was. It's not the card, it's the format. People just want to whine about blue not being the complete powerhouse it was in the past and apparently cancel is the whipping boy, despite being around for a while and not being that bad.
It's not ridiculous that a counterspell cost the same as Rhox War Monk or Blightning. People played Draining Whelk competitively, and that's a 6 mana counterspell. The only reason cancel is bad is because it lacks any kind of support, not that paying 3 mana is absurd to counter a spell (Faerie Trickery, Hinder, Double Negative, ...).
Cancel isn't that bad really. It's the same as double negative 80-90% of the time (with an easier casting cost), and better than Mindbreak Trap in most situations. It's on the edge of playability. It's not great, but it's definitely not as terrible as it's made out to be.
Most of the vitriol aimed at Cancel is purely based on "what things were" and not actually a reasoned look at the card itself.
I didn't mean that you wouldn't have 2 black to pay, but rather that it may prevent you from doing something like Sign into Cruel or Sign into Sorin. At any rate, that's kind of a minor point, as both aren't terribly hard to chain late game. The 2 life is more of a problem.
@Mooky: I'd suggest running some basic swamps. They turn on both Dragonskull and Drowned Catacombs, so a swamp means you won't have to worry about ever playing those tapped (not always relevant, but sometimes) and with your mana base you have to draw 3 copies of 12 specific lands to be able to play Cruel. I feel like you will run into situations a non-trivial amount of times where you are missing triple black for cruel, and it seems like you would struggle to play Sign in Blood consistently early game.
I was worried about the life loss from sign in blood, but it turned out to not be very relevant, and I actually liked Sign a lot. I rarely play a draw spell until turn 5 or 6, when I can play divination and still have mana to play other cards on the same turn, unless I'm in desperate need to draw something relevant. Sign in Blood is good because it steps up that clock to turn 4 for a draw 2 effect, whereas divination is turn 5. Sign in Blood is also a really good play turn 2 on the play against any deck that doesn't lead off with a mana producer. Turn 2 Sign in Blood means you can't play turn 3 Double Negative, but you don't need turn 3 Double negative on the play anyway, you'll need it turn 4 for Bloodbraid.
The only reason I would stick with 4 copies of Divination prior to adding any copies of Sign in Blood is because of the all-too common late game chaining Divinations into each other situations I find myself in all the time. With Sign in Blood that just gets painful (as well as being harder to cast...BBBB vs. 4UU).
The mana cost isn't an issue for Sign in Blood. Triple black is the easiest part for hitting Cruel, and double black for Sign in Blood is easier to hit than UUR for Double Negative, even though you obviously lead off with UUR for the turn 3 Double Neg. It's not unrealistic to play T1 Crumbling necropolis, T2 Mountain, T3 Island, and T4 swamp (or Drowned Catacomb/Dragonskull Summit) and be able to easily cast Sign in Blood and still keep up Mountain/Island for counter/Bolt.
My mana base isn't even black intensive, at least not to the levels of Chapin's mana base, and I still had absolutely no issues ever casting Sign in Blood. There are 12 lands that double as Black/x producers that allow you to cast Sign in Blood or cast Double Negative, etc.
One last reason to run Sign in Blood is that I picked up some style points for finishing a guy off with it when he was at 1! Divination can't kill, now can it!
I agree on Sphinx of Jwar Isle. I think that card is essential. Sphinx of Lost Truths is obviously good at digging to Cruel, but Sphinx of Jwar is simply good enough to where you might not even need the Cruel, and is a stand-alone threat. I liked the 2/1 split I ran, but I wouldn't cry cutting Sphinx of Lost Truths altogether.
This. If your opponent has a fistful of cards and probably has a nighthawk in hand, then don't bolt your guide (aka, the turn 4 tendrils). If your opponent just emptied or near emptied his hand with that tendrils, then bolt your guide. Holding back a bolt to give your opponent upwards of +6 life because you're afraid of them drawing into nighthawk is dumb. You just gave them extra turns to draw it.
Doesn't RDW run both 4 bolt and 4 Burst Lightning anyway? The chances of them top decking a nighthawk is lower than the chances of you top decking another card that kills it.
And for a more thread relevant discussion: Ruinblaster is really good against Jund and in Jund mirrors. Even if ruinblaster doesn't necessarily cut them off of a color of mana, it makes Broodmate that much harder to cast, or keeps them off of Bituminous Blast for another turn, etc.
I think that Gibantic deck is pretty awesome. I rarely play green, but I'm almost tempted to make an exception just to beat people with Gigantiform.
Here's the list I ran:
4 Scalding Tarn
4 Drowned Catacomb
4 Crumbling Necropolis
4 Swamp
4 Island
3 Mountain
1 Sphinx of Lost Truths
2 Sphinx of Jwar Isle
1 Sorin Markov
3 Cruel Ultimatum
2 Sign in Blood
4 Divination
2 Mind Spring
2 Essence Scatter
2 Flashfreeze
3 Double Negative
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Terminate
3 Earthquake
2 Runeflare Trap
3 Malakir Bloodwitch
2 Siege-Gang Commander
2 Flashfreeze
2 Pithing Needle
1 Sorin Markov
1 Earthquake
2 Deathmark
My list is wildly different from the guy who made top 4. My list has more "standard" choices (if there even is such a thing for an unproven deck), while his is a lot more rogue and techy. I can't say which is better without playing his list at all, but I will say that I like my list a lot and felt like it was simply stronger than any of the decks I played against. My loss to Vampires involved him beating me game 1, me winning game 2, and then game 3 being a really long drawn out match. At one point, he had no cards, no creatures, and I had 2 double negatives and a lightning bolt in hand. I thought I win for sure at that point, but I top deck 7 lands and lose. My loss to mono white involved a misplay turn 1 where I led off with the wrong land, and wasn't able to bolt his steppe lynx, which dealt me just enough damage for him to win (I was 1 life away from stablizing). Game 2 was very similar in that I nearly stabilized at 1 life, but I got blown out with a turn 6 Conqueror's pledge with brave the elements backup for my earthquake.
I beat Jund 3 rounds (2-1, 2-1, 2-0) with my only losses being identical: T2 putrid leech when I was on the draw with 2+ pieces of counter magic in hand and no bolt/terminate. I kept those hands hoping to get counter mana up before they dropped a relevant threat, and then just playing draw-go counter until I could drop a turn 5 SGC or turn 6 Sphinx or Turn 7 Cruel. My other wins were 2-0 to RWU control, 2-0 to GWB rock and 2-1 to 4 color sedraxis specter aggro.
W: 2-1 Jund
W: 2-1 Jund
W: 2-0 Jund
L: 1-2 Vampires
L: 0-2 Mono White Tokens
W: 2-0 RWU control
W: 2-0 GWB Rock
W: 2-1 4-color Ziggurat/Sedraxis Specter aggro
We might be able to work something out, if needed.
Basically, don't give your opponent the winning choice. If the winning choice is that they remove your cobra, so that they can't later kill your "insert fattie here" and the ramp is just a nice effect but ultimately unnecessary to your strategy, then play Cobra. If the winning choice is playing Bloodbraid on turn 3, then run Rampant.
So it's better than Grazing Gladehart in the worst case? Seems pretty fantastic to me.
The explanation of why it's bad involves you gaining 2 life a turn while the creature she brought into play doesn't die. I'm struggling to understand the bad part of this story, because that actually sounds really good to me, and exactly the kind of card Green uses to win games in this format.
I started playing in Time Spiral, the set when they first printed Cancel. People didn't complain about it then. It was played in teachings. I seriously never heard anyone whining on any forums about how bad Cancel was. It wasn't on the level of remand or rune snag, but it was worth playing alongside the two. I quit playing for a year after Lorwyn, and when I came back I saw an absurd number of posts dedicated to saying how bad cancel was. It's not the card, it's the format. People just want to whine about blue not being the complete powerhouse it was in the past and apparently cancel is the whipping boy, despite being around for a while and not being that bad.
It's not ridiculous that a counterspell cost the same as Rhox War Monk or Blightning. People played Draining Whelk competitively, and that's a 6 mana counterspell. The only reason cancel is bad is because it lacks any kind of support, not that paying 3 mana is absurd to counter a spell (Faerie Trickery, Hinder, Double Negative, ...).
Most of the vitriol aimed at Cancel is purely based on "what things were" and not actually a reasoned look at the card itself.